CHAPTER

9

Tnay, Chal.”

Zezula was the first to espy the latest arriving captive. Following her cheery greeting, Subar and then Sallow Behdul added their own. The hood of his suit still pulled down off his head, Chaloni acknowledged each of them in turn.

Closely monitoring the youthful interaction, Boujon was more perplexed than ever. None of what had happened made any sense. If the four young intruders had any sense, they should all be cowering and sniveling in fear, terrified of what might lie in store for them. And with good reason, since Boujon had several unpleasant things in mind. His employers granted him considerable leeway in such matters, and he had no intention of simply turning over the unsuccessful thieves to his superiors—or summarily disposing of them. Not without first discovering their hopes, notions, and specific intentions. His curiosity needed to be satisfied.

It had occurred to him that their presence might be a diversion, intended to draw his attention and that of his staff away from some larger, more elaborate and sophisticated assault from outside. But the storage complex had been on full alert all night, as always, and there was no sign of any additional unauthorized movement either inside the main structure or in the buffer zone immediately without.

To look at them, he thought bemusedly, one would think this was nothing more than an evening’s entertainment. Not a one, not even the youngest boy, showed the least concern for his or her important body parts, not to mention life. This indifference convinced Boujon he was overlooking something. It upset him. He prided himself not only on maintaining tight security on behalf of the complex’s operators, but also on knowing the details of every attempt at penetration. It was a matter of professional pride. Stepping forward, he determined to find out what he was missing. That he would do so, sooner and simply or later and more messily, he had not the slightest doubt.

“You know,” he began casually, “I could just have you all shot, right here and now, and the police would sign off on it without even having to be bribed. Breaking and entering repulsed by force. Filling out the relevant form would take less than five minutes.” Boujon focused his attention on the youth who appeared to be the leader of the group. “What have you to say to that?”

Chaloni nodded by way of agreement. “That’d be real efficient of you—but unnecessary. Also counterproductive. We can’t put together our report if we’re dead.”

“Report?” Boujon frowned. “What ‘report’?”

Harani was tentative as he gestured at Subar. “The small one there, he kept talking to me about some kind of ‘credit.’”

Instead of obtaining answers, Boujon was growing more confused. “What is all this?” He glared warningly at Chaloni. “I don’t like games. I don’t like being played for a fool.”

Chaloni raised both hands and chuckled. Forced amusement, or genuine? the security chief found himself wondering. What was he overlooking?

“Take it easy,” the strapping youth advised him. “Everything will be made clear.” He adjusted his stance, paying no attention to the weapons that were trained on him. “This has all been a test. Of building security. Of your competence and”—he glanced behind him at the trio of skeptical guards—“that of your staff. To see if this complex could be compromised by intruders you wouldn’t expect. I’m happy to say that, at least as far as I’m concerned, you’ve passed with flying colors.”

The woman who had brought him in gestured with her free hand as she addressed her boss. “What a load! Give the kid credit for nerve, though.”

An unruffled Chaloni looked back at her. “Think about it. What team of scrimmers would try a serious boost like this without a single gun?”

Her reaction showed that she had not considered this obvious fact. It was the same with Harani, though the expression on the face of the guard Joh remained hidden behind his protective face shield.

The security chief’s increasing anger gave way, at least temporarily, to indecision. “You found no weapons on any of them? Nothing?”

Harani shook his head. “Not so much as a pulsepopper, Mr. Boujon, sir.” He glanced over at his two associates, who indicated agreement.

That was, if nothing else, passing strange, Boujon decided. It was hardly conclusive proof of the smirking youth’s outrageous claim, but if true it would go a long way toward explaining his coolness and that of his companions. Such a thing was not unheard of, nor unprecedented, but it still struck him as a desperate attempt to turn a potentially deadly situation upside down. One way to find out the truth was to simply shoot them one at a time until those left alive finally cracked.

Unless he was all wrong about this, and they were telling the truth. Then he would be the one left facing Shaeb holding his future in his hands.

Do like the kid recommended, he told himself. Take it easy. No need to rush things. The truth, whatever it was, could be drawn out.

“Why would anyone wanting to run a check on building security send a bunch of kids to test its efficiency?”

Chaloni had anticipated the question. “It was thought it might lower your suspicions if any of us were spotted outside, and that we might be able to get in close more easily for just that reason: because you wouldn’t be as threatened by a bunch of ‘kids.’ Incidentally, we were all specially trained for this job.”

Looking on while listening intently and fighting to keep his breathing steady and even, Subar worried that the older youth might be overdoing things. But the security chief didn’t challenge him on the claim. Leastwise, not yet.

Rubbing his chin, Boujon eyed the gang leader shrewdly. “Uh-huh. Then tell me this. If you’re here to test security—why haven’t I heard anything about it?”

Subar tensed, but once again the wily Chaloni had prepared for the query. “Wouldn’t be much of a test of security,” he murmured with a diffident shrug, “if the system and managers responsible for maintaining it were warned of the forthcoming test in advance.”

Boujon said nothing. Then he gestured at the woman and the one called Joh. “You two: I want you to act as if you haven’t heard a word this scrug has said. As far as you’re concerned, they’re all low-grade thieves. If they move funny, look funny, talk funny, take their legs out.” He then nodded at Harani, who followed his supervisor to a far corner of the office.

“What do you think about this, Quevar?” Boujon whispered. “Bunch of crola?”

“With froth on top,” the big man agreed. “But what if it’s true? Could be a bonus in it for all of us.”

“Bonus or a bullet.” The security chief let out a snort. “Only one way to know for sure. Check with Mr. Shaeb.”

“Sure.” Harani nodded eagerly. “Why didn’t we think of that before?”

Boujon made a face. “I thought of it as soon as the kid with the sly mouth made his preposterous claim. There’s only one problem.” He indicated his wrist communit. “It’s still three hours to sunrise. You know Mr. Shaeb. If I wake him out of a sound sleep now, it won’t matter whether these kids are thieves or testers. He’ll have all of us mindwiped or worse just to make a point.”

Mention of their superior’s sometimes toxic habits was enough to make Harani swallow hard. “Then what do we do, Mr. Boujon, sir?”

The security chief grunted. “We wait. Until sunup. If nothing else, Noritski’s day crew will be coming on and we can turn the watch over to them while we proceed.” He glanced in the direction of the four captives. None betrayed the least indication of unease as they waited for the two men to conclude their private conversation. “Meanwhile, I’ll keep questioning them. Maybe they’ll slip up and let something out. They’re secured, so they can’t hurt anything or get away.” He smiled softly at his subordinate. “Better to be safe than sorry—especially where Shaeb is concerned.”

The two men rejoined the rest of the assemblage. Hirani resumed his watchful stance behind the youthful quartet while Boujon once more confronted them. “My associate and I have decided to let you live.”

“Good call,” the unfazed Chaloni replied approvingly.

“For a little while,” Boujon finished. “Until I can check out your story you’ll stay here.” A thin, humorless smile creased his broad visage. “Bound and determined, I suppose.”

“Really, you’ve got nothing to worry about.” Despite his age, Chaloni sounded very reassuring. “You’ve all done a great job, and it’s going to reflect well on you.”

“We’ll see,” Chaloni responded. “We’ll know everything we need to know within a few hours. If you’re telling the truth, I’ll be first in line to apologize. If you’re full of…” He broke off, blinking and swaying slightly. “That’s funny.” Leaning forward slightly, he tried to focus on his subordinates. “You don’t look so good, Harani.”

The burly guard was swallowing repeatedly, as if he had just ingested something that didn’t agree with him. “Don’t feel so good, either, Mr. Boujon, sir.”

“In fact,” the security chief went on, “none of you looks right.” Feeling suddenly unsteady himself, he turned sharply to confront the leader of the young pack of infiltrators. “You’d better tell me, right now, if anything is…” He failed to finish the sentence. Hands secured behind his back, Chaloni was equally shaky on his feet. He looked distant as well as dazed.

“Don’t…don’t know what you’re talking about, tvan. Does feel kind of hot in here, though.”

“Hey,” Zezula piped up, “I think I can smell my own blood.” She looked around at her companions. “Anybody else got something wiro or viro up their nose?” With that, she promptly sat down where she had been standing. Ignoring the muffled orders of the guard Joh, she closed her eyes, rolled over onto her side, and was almost instantly asleep. Next to her, Subar gave up trying to keep his eyes open and his attention focused, and he joined her in sprawling out on the floor.

“Get up!” Simultaneously angry and afraid, Harani gestured with his gun. When neither threat had any effect, he kicked the now dozing Chaloni in the ribs. Not hard enough to break anything, but forcefully enough so that the blow could not be ignored by anyone attempting to feign unconsciousness. The hitherto talkative youth didn’t respond.

Thoroughly disoriented now, Boujon stumbled toward the one interloper who had not said a word since being hauled into the room. Though misting over, the security chief’s gaze was still focused enough to repeatedly take the measure of the biggest youth. Approaching Sallow Behdul, he scowled.

“Say, weren’t you…weren’t you taller when I brought you in?” Frowning, Boujon’s gaze dropped again, this time to the boy’s feet. No, not to his feet. To his shoes. The soles, the thick soles—they were almost gone as they seemed to be evaporating before the security chief’s eyes. These shut before they could widen, and Boujon toppled over onto the floor.

Only the guard Joh realized what was happening. Seeing coworkers and captives alike collapsing to the ground, he turned and staggered in the direction of a rear cabinet. Wrenching the doors open, he reached in and began fumbling for one of the transparent masks that lay on a top shelf. His other hand he kept pressed to the center of his face, which almost seemed to collapse under the pressure. Realization had come too late, however, even for the most resistant of the security team. Instead of sitting down, the guard settled onto his haunches. Only then did his head fall forward, indicating that he had gone as insensible as his companions.

Sallow Behdul lay not far away, similarly unconscious. The thick soles of his shoes had completely disintegrated. Or rather dissipated, the artfully shaped and solidified chemicals of which they had been fashioned having by now completely filled the security room and much of the storage complex with a narcoleptic gas that was odorless, colorless, undetectable by the sensors that continued to sit silently in their respective holders, and very effective. Focused on the edgy Subar, the beauteous Zezula, and the garrulous Chaloni, Boujon and his subordinates had made the mistake of paying little attention to the silent and complaisant Sallow Behdul. Big mistake.

Behdul was soft-spoken. Not stupid.

Several minutes passed. Within the security room and the complex at large nothing moved. Then a portal opened at the east end of the main building. A small stolen transport vehicle entered as the door closed behind it. Several alarms went off and were ignored. No one notified the nearest police facility of the unauthorized intrusion because the last thing the owners and operators of the complex wanted was representatives of local law enforcement poking through their diverse inventory of highly illegal imports. The complex had been tailored to be guarded and protected from within.

Not this morning.

The transport whined to a halt halfway into the complex and pivoted neatly on its axis so that it was pointed back in the direction of the doorway. Two figures emerged, one from each side of the vehicle. Over their faces they wore recycling masks to protect them from the persistent, long-acting gas. Walking quickly but without panic toward the security center, they found captives and captors alike collapsed on the floor. A nearby console was alive with warning lights, which were ignored.

Working swiftly and efficiently, just as they had practiced, Dirran and Missi slipped masks over the faces of their four anesthetized friends. Once this was done, injectors packed with revival antidote were slapped onto arms or legs. Coughing and swallowing repeatedly, Chaloni, Subar, Zezula, and Sallow Behdul rapidly regained consciousness. Small sidearms matching those the two newcomers carried were provided to the revived, though if everything went according to Chaloni’s plan these would not have to be used.

So far, Subar decided as he wiped at his eyes and struggled to his feet, everything had gone exactly as rehearsed.

The alchem broker who had sculpted the shoe-sole-shaped gas solids had assured Chal that in the absence of the antidote, anyone inhaling a good, stiff lungful of the stuff would remain asleep for hours. That should give them more than enough time, Subar knew, to pick and choose the choicest items from among the storage complex’s inventory. Rising, he brushed himself off. So subtle had been effects of the gas that he could barely remember passing out.

His opinion of Chaloni, which had always been a mix of respect, admiration, and wariness, rose considerably. It had all gone just as he had enthusiastically described it. The security staff lay sprawled all around them, maskless and insensible. The whole point of their elaborate individual attempts to penetrate the building’s security had been to distract and preoccupy the guards—mentally as well as physically—and to get them off station and gathered together in one place. He smiled. They had been so busy bringing in him and his friends that once that had been accomplished, they had relaxed. It was critical that they do so, because as tough as he and his friends thought themselves, Chaloni knew they could never have outmaneuvered or overpowered trained adult professionals.

Gathered together in one place, however, they could then be brought down by the solidified gas that formed the soles of Sallow Behdul’s shoes. Of course, for the subterfuge to work, it would hardly do for Subar and his friends to be found with antidotes, much less face masks, on their person. They had to subject themselves to the knockout effects of the same gas as their targets.

Now that Dirran and Missi had entered and revived them, they could get down to business. Subar let his gaze take in the impressive contents of the storage complex. Chal was right. They were going to be rewarded with cred beyond their wildest dreams. And the best part of it was that the illegal importers, whoever they were, couldn’t report the boost to the police. Making sure his mask was sealed tightly to his face, he started for the doorway. A voice made him halt and whirl.

“Tlali!” It was Dirran, calling out from the back of the security room. “One of these scrugs is still kicking!”

Literally, Subar saw as he and the others hurried to respond to Dirran’s cry of distress. Lying on his right side on the floor, the guard called Joh kept kicking out with his left leg, like a dreaming dog. Chaloni looked disgusted.

“Is that all he’s doing? If it bothers you, make him stop.” He hesitated a moment before adding, “Don’t kill him. So far we haven’t had to kill anybody. Let’s try to keep it that way. Not that it makes any difference to me,” he added smarmily, “but a ’radication might force whoever runs this operation to bring in the authorities even if they don’t want to.” Turning, he and the others left to begin rifling through the building’s inventory.

That left Subar and Dirran alone with the semi-conscious guard. Subar eyed the body uncertainly. “He’s breathing funny, too.”

“Sure he’s breathing funny.” In Chaloni’s absence, Dirran readily assumed the mantle of leader. “His respiratory system is full of the gas. Here, I’ll show you how it’s done.” Looking around, the older boy chose a chair, raised it above his head, and brought it down on the side of the prone guard’s head with just the right degree of emphasis. The reflexive leg-kicking stopped immediately.

Pleased with himself, Dirran set the chair aside. “See? If you don’t want to kill somebody, it’s better to hit ’em lighter but more often, until you’ve achieved the desired effect.”

Leaning toward the body, Subar frowned uncertainly. “Looks like you might’ve smashed in part of his skull. I see a definite depression where you hit him.”

“Yeah, well.” Dirran sounded less assured. “Can’t be too bad. I didn’t hit him that hard.” Resolutely adopting a more cheerful note, he added, “Let’s go join the others. Don’t want to be left out of the looting.” He turned and headed for the entrance.

Subar lingered just a moment longer. There was something peculiar about the now entirely inert guard. He couldn’t quite put a finger on it. Something about the way that leg had kept kicking out, about bulges of muscle where there shouldn’t be any and a lack of muscle where it ought to be prominent. About how the right side of the head had been partially caved in by the swing of Dirran’s chair, but without the expected echo of cracking bone. His natural curiosity drove him to want to examine the body further.

But Dirran was right. If he stayed here, poking and prodding the unconscious guard, he’d miss out on the chance to pocket a few small souvenirs of his own. That interested in the guard he was not. Turning, he broke into a run as he hurried in Dirran’s wake. Like his companions, where Subar was concerned, cred triumphed curiosity every time.

Having thought better of Subar, Flinx would have found the younger boy’s blanket identification with his friends simultaneously enlightening and depressing.

Deprived of its watchful sentries, the warehouse was a giant candy store. An ordinary group of youths would have found it interesting but would have been overwhelmed and confused by the surfeit of merchandise on offer. Not Chaloni and his gang. Having been apprised of the nature of its most valuable stock prior to planning the raid, he had a pretty good idea what to ignore and what to pull for loading onto the transport Dirran and Missi had brought.

Larger Terran objects such as the Roman-era statue were ignored. While immensely valuable, they were too conspicuous to be hauled around Malandere. “Take nothing bigger than you can carry by yourself” was Chaloni’s directive.

Into the transport went a Sung dynasty plate, all blue-and-white earthly ceramic and bonded against the elements in its transparent protective cocoon. Even to Subar’s uneducated eyes it was a thing of beauty. Chaloni had to explain to a curious Sallow Behdul that the encasement was necessary to preserve the plate because it could easily be broken. Behdul absorbed this information in disbelief. Poor as his family was, he had never encountered or even heard of a serving dish that was neither biodegradable nor impervious to shattering.

Missi found a small, vacuum-sealed bottle full of flower seeds. Flowers from Earth! As an organic, it was a doubly illegal import. That would not matter to the wealthy collector who would pay whatever was asked to acquire such a prize. The bottle had the additional virtue of being small, nondescript, and easily concealed. Other venerable antiques existed only as fragments of what had once been: half a Russian gold coin, a manual bottle opener with the insignia of the long-vanished Terran brewery still visible on the handle, a printed two-dimensional poster of an unknown actress from the distant past, half a dozen garishly imprinted drink cups made of the early and rare artificial material known as Styrofoam, a real book composed of pages fashioned of tree paper written by a long-forgotten author named Aram Fotep, and much, much more.

As they worked, electronic sensors tracked their movements. Relayed to security central, these set off alarm after alarm. The visual ones the laughing, frolicking young intruders could not see. The audible alarms they ignored. Their rampage was frenetic but controlled; a frenzy of unzipped cartons, debonded containers, and shredded shipping packets.

Though the original plan called for all plunder to be gathered in one place and the proceeds to be shared equally, youthful venality rapidly triumphed over collective purpose. A fair number of smaller objects found their way into shoes and pockets. Subar managed to secrete on his person a battered spoon fashioned of some cheap metal whose head flaunted a depiction of something called THE GATEWAY ARCH and a small, square package of pepper on which was printed the name of a restaurant. Astonishingly, and adding greatly to the value, it still contained its minute quantity of venerable if no longer viable Terran spice. He had no idea what these things might be worth, only that they were worth something.

Coincidental with the arrival of the first hint of morning sunshine, they shut the rear and side doors of the transport, piled in, and abandoned the building to its still-unconscious security staff and its surfeit of winking, wailing alarms. No one challenged them as they drove off. As they made their way out into the maze of the commercial district, going neither too fast nor too slow, other similar vehicles could be seen taken on cargo or delivering goods. Their vehicle, stolen especially for the early morning’s work, drew no attention. Once out of the commercial district, they kept clear of the main transportation arteries, sticking to lesser surface accessways, sacrificing speed and automated navigation for control and continued anonymity.

At last convinced that they had pulled it off and were safely clear, the whoops and hollers of the excited perpetrators resounded inside the goods-filled transport. Even the normally jaded and indifferent Zezula joined in the joyful celebration. The kiss she bestowed on a startled Subar was as shocking and unexpected as anything that had happened to him that morning, and as valued as anything he had managed to conceal on his person. It left him feeling at once confused, agitated, and energized in ways he could not describe as he began to peel away his facial sprayon.

Around him, his companions were doing likewise. Chaloni, who had chosen the appearance of an older, pudgier youth of Oriental mien, was flinging shards of collated collagen in all directions. Missi was carefully peeling away her albino visage to reveal the much darker natural complexion beneath. Sallow Behdul exposed his naked and tattooed pate by dispensing with the long black wig he had worn. Nearby, Zezula had slipped out of the shoes that had added six centimeters to her height and was busily divesting herself of the false stomach that had given her the look of a woman in the middle stages of pregnancy.

The warehouse’s automated monitoring devices, both prominent and concealed, that would undoubtedly have recorded their activities would reveal to anyone reviewing the numerous recordings a group of six active youths in the process of pillaging the warehouse—not one of whom bore any readily distinguishable relationship to Subar and his friends. The cosmetic sprayons they now gleefully discarded had been created by Missi, the most artistically inclined of the group. They had then been rendered in Shell, purchased anonymously, and applied in secret. There was no trail for any active pursuer to track. Let the outraged owners of the storage complex put out huge rewards for all of them. They would be attached to idents that bore no visible relation to the half a dozen buoyant youths who were presently celebrating their good fortune in the interior of the shrouded transport.

They had only one bad moment, when a police skimmer appeared directly in front of them. It did not slow as it approached them, however, and thrummed past overhead without slowing or pausing to challenge the vehicle with the hastily altered ident code. No further interruptions ensued as they reached the inner-city rental storage facility, identified themselves to the automated security system, entered, and backed the transport into the secure holding compartment Chaloni had rented.

Working silently and in tandem, it took barely an hour to unload, catalog, and stack the spoils. More time was expended piling used household goods of little value on top and around the booty. Leaving their pickings suitably camouflaged, they drove out the transport and sealed the storage locker behind them. So that none of them would feel the least bit apprehensive or slighted, Chaloni magnanimously allowed each of them to enter their signature retinal and bioelectrical impulses into the facility’s security system. Now any one of them could access the rented unit.

“We don’t want to go putting anything up for sale right away,” he counseled his companions as the abandoned stolen transport exited the area and drove itself off. “We need to let the boosted nap, need to let the noise subside a little.” His face was flushed with the excitement and triumph of what they had just pulled off. “Then we’ll start selling. A few items at a time, to different fences. The cred will flow!”

Following Chaloni’s final programming, the stolen transport headed for Inatuku, a city on the far side of Visaria. The likelihood of it being traced back to him, or to any of them, was remote. They then split up, traveling separately by public transport and on foot, until they rendezvoused later that afternoon at the priv place on the roof of the old building in Alewev District.

The brief, earlier celebration inside the transport notwithstanding, it was only then that they all really cut loose. Even Sallow Behdul was smiling and laughing, though he said as little as ever. Chaloni surprised them all by breaking out a packet of mojolo stim-sticks. Very high quality, imported from Fluva, and a varietal they had heard of but had not previously been able to try out. Everyone promptly lit up. Within minutes, the interior of the meeting room was awash in the fragrant airborne stimulus. Colors intensified, the sour stink of their immediate surroundings was banished, and all the troubles and tribulations of their otherwise barely tolerable, wretched existences were wafted away on a haze of aromatic smoke.

After a while, Subar was aware someone was in his arms. At first he took her to be Missi, but soon realized it was Zezula. Her eyes were glassy, her expression beatific. Sprawled across an old couch on the other side of the room with less than a third of a stimstick remaining clamped in his slash of a mouth, Chaloni was grinning across at him. Subar had always been by turns respectful, chary, and envious of the gang leader. But at that moment, he would have died for him.

Though it did not seem so at that especially mind-blowing moment on that particularly jubilant afternoon, it was a possibility that was not as far from reality as he might have wished.